The Mirrorverse
Chapter 81

Syrhahn

“Hey, how are you, friend?” Syrhahn asked William in a style more befitting Xhisara. William clearly realised who he was up against, as he backed up until the wall of the cargo bay dictated he moved no more. Syrhahn decided to take the bipolar psychopath track for the proceedings. He had many guises for interrogating people, and this was one of them.

Without warning, he bent down, picked up the body of Brian and threw it at William as hard as he could. The body was only the size of a child to him, but he still felt every moment of his age.

Joe and Les were either side of William, ready to step in. Les looked shocked and jumped aside, but Joe didn’t miss a beat. Maya and the Ka’s were behind Syrhahn, and Xhisara had gone off somewhere.

William looked absolutely terrified. Syrhahn gloated internally at turning the abductor of his son into a wet piece of lettuce.

“So,” continued Syrhahn, hanging on to the word. “Looking for someone. Have you seen my son lately?” Syrhahn strode up to William as he attempted to flatten himself against the wall to get as far away from Syrhahn as possible.

“He’s alive, he’s alive,” he offered rapidly, clearly understanding what pain was due to him before he died very slowly.

“And where exactly, is that?” Syrhahn’s voice returned to being light and sweet.

“In a cell block with the blonde girl, Ellie, he’s in the next cell, I can take you there,” he offered, as I watched hope glint through his eyes.

“Big stone structure on an island isolated in the middle of an ocean?” asked Syrhahn, still oozing niceties. “Or so we’ve heard.”

Syrhahn made out that we didn’t know where it was so William thought he would still have a chance to escape in transit.

Syrhahn could see William thinking, conjuring a lie, which meant that was the last place he’d seen them. If it was elsewhere, he would have said so instantly, he wasn’t going to give his life to protect a secret he couldn’t care less about.

William didn’t fall for the trap, but then Syrhahn didn’t expect him to.

“No, we moved them from there,” William lied expertly. His poise was perfect, but there were some extraneous movements, including a slight muscle jerk in his right shoulder and an almost unnoticeable tightening of his neck muscles.

He also looked up and right, as an obvious left hander that meant he was constructing visual images. It wasn’t a dead cert, but as a sociopath he was unlikely to let anything else go. It was possible he knew what he was doing, but it didn’t do him any favours letting Syrhahn think he lied about that.

“I think it’s time you told me the truth,” smiled Syrhahn. In one swift movement William was lying face down on the floor and there was a compound fracture in his left humerus. Syrhahn was still holding his left arm, and William was screaming at the top of his lungs.

“Now,” started Syrhahn, all jolly again. “Listen to me!” He spoke loudly and William’s noise died down so Syrhahn stopped pulling on his arm. “Where and when was the last time you saw Viskra and Ellie?”

“Earlier before we came to the land of the Spectrals!” he cried out. There was no way he could have fabricated anything with the amount of pain he was receiving from the arm Syrhahn was still manipulating.

“Where?” Syrhahn shouted over the screaming. He took no pleasure hearing his pain. He just wanted his son, and something just wasn’t adding up.

“The stone cells in the ocean I’ll take you there I’ll take you!” his dignity had vanished as the pain took over his entire consciousness.

“They’re not there,” Syrhahn informed him. He had already deduced that William didn’t know that.

“That’s not possible,” whimpered William. Syrhahn picked him up by his mangled arm amid blood-curdling screams and stamped on the side of his left knee. He did enjoy the snapping sound a little, something he had never felt before as an assassin, he had always been devoid of emotion during interrogations.

Syrhahn dropped him onto the floor, noting Joe’s horrified face. His face displayed pity, even sympathy so he immediately noted Joe as a potential enemy. From what Syrhahn had heard, they had kicked around together for decades and Joe had been as bad as William, if not worse.

The animal was rolling around on the floor in complete agony. Syrhahn bent down beside his head, he had more questions.

“Do you want more pain?” he asked him, and he shook his head crying out ‘no’. “Who else knew they were there?”

“Brian!” he howled.

“Only Brian?” he called over his cries.

“Zinia, but she’d dead!”

“See, even creatures like you can tell the truth...” Syrhahn covered his mouth with his hand so he could hear his soft taunts. “Was Viskra alive when you left him?”

William nodded. Syrhahn was still watching Joe in his peripheral vision, with his back to the wall to prevent being encroached from the rear.

“Was Ellie?” Syrhahn knew she would have been the test subject for the weapon, it made no other sense to keep her alive. Unless they were using her as a sex toy.

William shook his head.

“Did you shoot her with the weapon?”

William whimpered, flailing his head around needing to scream out in pain. Finally he nodded.

Syrhahn looked up at Maya, “They’re both still alive.”

Syrhahn had watched all those shot with the weapon return to life. Whatever Viskra had done, he’d duped the monsters. And escaped.